Virial expansion of a harmonically trapped Fermi gas across a narrow Feshbach resonance

Abstract

We theoretically investigate the high-temperature thermodynamics of a harmonically trapped Fermi gas across a narrow Feshbach resonance, by using the second-order quantum virial expansion, and point out some new features compared to the broad resonance. The interatomic interaction is modeled by the pseudopotential with an additional parameter, i.e., the effective range, to characterize the narrow resonance width. Deeply inside the width of a narrow Feshbach resonance, we find the second virial coefficient evolves with the effective range from the well-known universal value 1/4 in the broad-resonance limit to one another value 1/2 in the narrow-resonance limit. This means the Fermi gas is more strongly interacted at the narrow resonance. In addition, far beyond the resonance width, we find the harmonically trapped Fermi gas still manifests appreciable interaction effect across a narrow Feshbach resonance, which is contrary to our knowledge of the broad Feshbach resonance. All our results can be directly tested in current narrow Feshbach resonance experiments, which are generally carried out in a harmonic trap.